The Department of Agriculture of the La Nkwantanang-Madina Municipal Assembly held its annual Research-Extension-Farmer Linkage Committee (RELC) meeting on Tuesday, 30th of August, 2022 at Madina Social Welfare. RELC was established to enable various stakeholders share ideas on how to improve on the weak linkages existing between research institutions, extension activities and policy makers.
The objective of RELC is to make research and extension provide demand-driven services to farmers and other stakeholders which include farmers, input dealers, processors, marketers and consumers. The meeting also serves as a platform for stakeholders to take active participation, enhance interaction and brings decision making in technology development and dissemination closer to farmers and agribusinesses.
Some constraints identified included complexity in the control of strips in onion and green houses, increasing urbanization, poor quality of feed inputs, lack of veterinary clinic, poor packaging materials (use of plastic bottles) and adulteration of processed products which were categorized under crops, livestock, agro-processing and marketing respectively. Another general issue that was discussed at the planning session was the unavailability of research findings to field officers.
This year’s planning session had twenty-two (22) males and eleven (11) females giving a total of thirty-three (33) participants.
Actors along the agricultural value chain present at this year’s event were processors, marketers, livestock farmers, poultry farmers among others. Also present were Agric Extension Agents (AEAs), District Agric Officers (DAOs), the Municipal Director of Agriculture as well as the Greater Accra Regional RELC Coordinator and the deputy.
SOURCE: ISD-LaNMMA
